


you can sit beside me when the world comes down

by naeuns



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-12
Updated: 2014-09-12
Packaged: 2018-02-17 03:51:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2295647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/naeuns/pseuds/naeuns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Slowly opening up isn’t easy. Cora starts to wonder if the stargazing (or ‘star glaring’, as Lydia calls it) is her problem, or if it’s pretty girls who are a glimpse of the past, standing strong and making people admire them. (It’s probably still the stargazing.)</p><p>cordia zombie apocalypse! au feat. the hale siblings, lena, and the mccall pack!!!</p>
            </blockquote>





	you can sit beside me when the world comes down

**Author's Note:**

  * For [holidaysinunitedstates](https://archiveofourown.org/users/holidaysinunitedstates/gifts).



> SO i hope this is amazing for my giftee, theisleofiona!!!!!!! i used the zombie au and stars prompts and had so much fun making and editing this fic and i hope it's everything you could dream for!!!!!
> 
> also, all the thanks to my beta em, raisealittlehale (on tumblr and here!!!!!) she has truly made this fic as enjoyable and it is and her writing is also amazing so check her out!!!!!
> 
> lastly, the title is from the song "mona lisa" by the all-american rejects, and please please feel free to leave any comments or criticism on this fic and feel free to hmu at my tumblr bisexualmccall anytime!!

           No one’s really sure how it started. After a zombie apocalypse occurs, the people who try to figure it out are usually ambitious scientists, and curiosity kills more than just cats. Those who are smart will think about the “what” instead of the “why” and “how”. At least that’s what Cora thinks, even if it’s only been three days since the ‘outbreak’ or ‘apocalypse’ or whatever. Why waste time wondering where the goddamn things came from, when you could be planning how to survive and make zombies a dumbass fanboy fantasy again? When there are undead cannibals running around, every second should be focused on how to ensure a humans-only victory. Specifically non-zombies, as she’s pretty sure she would like to be a victor too, not dead or trying to chew someone’s brains out.

         But brainpower – and her actual brain – isn’t something that she or anyone else can really afford to focus on right now. She needs to think about survival and how she’s going to get herself through this; maybe she can think about what she wants to do with her life after this whole thing ends. Because it’s going to end.

          “Or will it?” the asshole voice in her brain (that sounds a little too much like Stiles) says. As usual, it’s trying to make her doubt herself.

           Problem is, it just might be working.

;;

          She’ll never tell them, but Laura, Derek, and Lena are the only reason she’s so keen on surviving. Well, it’s probably also some natural instincts kicking in – both werewolf and human. But she thinks ninety percent of it is her family.  Her pack.

          Cora wants to make sure that Lena will be able to grow up with a normal childhood – being scared of the dark for dumb, petty reasons, not because of the real creatures hiding in it. Laura wants to give that to her daughter; to be able to yell at her for going out too late because she doesn’t trust the people she’s with, not because she might be torn apart for her flesh. Cora sees it in Laura’s eyes when she breaks down in a corner of their tattered minivan once Lena’s fallen asleep: the fear and longing for something normal, or as normal as a family of werewolves could ever hope to be.

          She’s not sure how Derek is, but she’s guessing it isn’t too fucking great. They’re leaving Beacon Hills, and it may have been a literal beacon for every shitty thing that could possibly happen, but it was their home. More of Derek’s home – she knows it probably means more to him than to her. All she remembers is the fire and barely getting out and the vault and Boyd. When she was a child, Beacon Hills may have been home, but now it’s just a symbol for everything she’s had to endure, every part of her life she’s lost. As they drive out of town, though, Derek quiet in the backseat, she grieves for his sake.

          Cora was initially pissed at the thought of running to some type of ‘zombie apocalypse shelter’ instead of facing the damned creatures – she’s pretty sure their claws can rip a zombie apart in seconds. She, Laura, and Derek had had some arguments about it, actually; wolfed-out and screaming at each other. (Well, more of her at them.) But she’d settled down at the chance to get out of Beacon Hills, the chance of a life where maybe they can rebuild.

         “Or just a life of hiding,” the Stiles voice remarks. Cora shuts it out. Maybe this time, the monsters won’t be able to win.  

;;

          Cora wakes up in the middle of the night and stares through the dirty rear window of the car. Above and all around her is the jet-black sky, dotted with tiny stars and their constellations, some being blocked by the movement of the windshield wipers.

          When she was about five, she remembers her mother tracing the patterns of the night sky with her. Her mother is, to date, one of the most powerful alphas Cora’s ever known; Talia Hale had the love and admiration of not only her peers, but of her children as well. Cora recalls looking up at the stars with hopeful eyes as her mother told her legends and myths from across the globe.

          She recalls one from the Caddo tribe – another pack leader told her mother a story during a visit to Oklahoma, a story she then passed on to her children.  Cora can still hear her mother’s voice, smooth and strong with every word. “At a council, Coyote suggested that when people die, they should all be treated alike. At this time, some people come back, and others are forever lost. Coyote believed that to make it fair, those who die should never be seen again, and that they should take their places as stars in the night sky.”

         Cora thinks Coyote should _**fuck**_ off, because seeing dead people in the stars is probably a result of high quality crack (definitely not the kind she tried to snort in a dark alley when she was fourteen). At least having all the dead people return would bring along temporary happiness.

          But maybe Coyote did know what he was talking about. Maybe it’s best to let the dead lie in their graves, and let the living suffer through it.

;;

          It’s taken them two days to reach the City of Angels. (Cora hopes it’s still angels that they’ll find there, not even more zombies.) It should’ve been eight hours straight, but their car broke down more times than any of them could count.

          The time it takes them to direct themselves to the Staples Center is too long for Cora’s taste, and she decides to pick a fight with Derek about him being a shitty navigator – which, honestly, he is.  Derek tells her she’s a teenage mess filled with angst (which, honestly, she probably is), and Cora tries – almost successfully – to claw at his face. Laura tries to stop them from fighting, and instead just gets involved till it’s one large screaming match, complete with glowing eyes and clenched, clawed fists. It takes Lena screaming at the top of her lungs to get them to stop and mutter apologies to each other.

          After about three hundred turns, and fifteen glares among the trio of adults, they reach their destination. Cora climbs out of the trunk (hey, it’s more comfortable than sleeping on seatbelts) of the minivan and looks up at the building. It’s large, but she’s not sure it could fit a good chunk of California’s residents inside of it.

          “This thing’ll only be able to fit a little over a hundred thousand people at most, right? Do we really have to crowd in here like pack ra–”

          Derek interrupts her before she gets to mention her least favorite rodent. “It’s either that or you can sleep on the streets and fend for yourself.”

          “Derek, Cora, both of you lower your voices, Lena hasn’t slept this soundly for days. Cora, there’s another complex, L.A. Live, right there – I’m guessing people have been spread around. Haven’t either of you been to this city? It’s only a couple hours away.”

          Knowing very well that both of them can hear her, Cora mutters, “With Derek’s driving skills? And not all of us were having one night stands while we were presumed dead.”  

          The icy looks she receives probably up the glare count by ten.

;;

          Upon entering the building, they are met with absolute chaos. People are lined up in front of what look like ravaged, half-destroyed ticket stands, screaming at the people inside of the booths. There are patches on the floor where Cora assumes there used to be actual flooring.

          “I never thought that I’d say this, but maybe we should have stayed in Beacon Hills.”

          Derek sighs. “It’s this or we go back and take the things on ourselves, Cora. And we can’t exactly protect our _toddler_ niece properly if we try to kill every zombie ourselves. This place is our best chance.”

          She considers making her own way, but even if she is a werewolf, she probably won’t make it against thousands of rotting pseudo-humans without a pack. “Fine, we’ll stay in this shithole until this epidemic finishes or whatever.” Laura just rolls her eyes.

          “Hey, haven’t seen you guys around here! Zombies huh, who would have thought, right?!” a middle-aged man says. He looks like he’s off to go take a million pictures of tourist attractions, with his Hawaiian shirt, cargo shirts, and boundless enthusiasm. Cora dislikes him immediately, and moves to threaten him, but Laura stomps on her foot as she opens her mouth. Just quietly enough that only the three of them can hear, Laura hisses, “This guy might be our only chance of actually getting around this garbage dump, so kindly shut the hell up and let me do the talking. I swear, both of you have the social skills of actual wolves.”

          At a more normal volume, and with her most charming smile, she adds, “Hello, Mr.…?”

          “It’s Mr. Richards, but you can call me Taylor!” “Lovely to meet you! I’m Laura Hale, and these are my siblings, Derek and Cora, and my daughter, Lena.”

          Mr. Richards beams. (Cora nearly growls at him.) “What a beautiful family! Let me show you folks around this place! It may be a little hard to navigate, but it’s cozy nonetheless.”

;;

          At this point, taking on the zombies alone sounds pretty good to Cora. At least then she wouldn’t be stuck with Mr. Overly-Enthusiastic-And-Trying-To-Hit-On-My-Sister. As he leads them to his corner of the building, some asshole bumps into her.

           “Fucking watch where you’re go– Stiles?”

          “Cora? What are you doing here by your– hey Derek and Laura! Oh and little Lena too! Scott, everybody, get over here!”

          Laura, Lena, and Derek have all turned to stare by now – really, what are the odds of meeting up with the rest of Beacon Hills’ supernatural side?

          “Stiles?” Laura and Derek exclaim in unison. (Her older siblings have a talent for stating the obvious.)

          Stiles grins and waves. “Hey guys! What’re you doing here? Would’ve figured with all the werewolf–”

          Cora kicks his shin and glares. Of course the idiot would reveal their secret in front of what’s left of the state of California.

          “Ow! What was that for– oh! Uh, you, I would have thought that with all the werewolf video games back home you’d be able to protect yourself!” Idiot.

          With Stiles around, Laura knows their secret will be out within five minutes, so she thanks Call-Me-Taylor for the tour and says, very politely, that they think they’ve got it from there. He leaves (finally) and Stiles brings them over to the rest of the ‘McCall Pack’: Scott, moral compass and True Alpha; Allison, a fucking hunter; Stiles, smartass human; Isaac, asshole beta; and finally Lydia, princess and some sort of psychic/genius hybrid. Cora is most emphatically unimpressed.

           Derek might know and trust these people, but Cora doesn’t, and usually she would be making every excuse to stay away from them. In a zombie apocalypse where you have a tiny niece to protect, though, ‘the more, the merrier’ may actually be relevant.

;;

          It’s either that Scott and Co. miraculously found a completely empty room to stay in, or that no one wanted to stay around a group of annoying teenagers. Cora is almost a hundred percent positive that it’s the latter. They were having some kind of ‘hang out’ or something just before the alarm was sent out to evacuate, leaving them to travel across the state in Stiles’ jeep. (She is not jealous that it didn’t break down a single time. Not at all.)

          She finds out that the wall that encompasses the area around them was built by the people in the surrounding area, and that it’s thickened and worked on every day to improve its quick and probably shitty initial building. Scott, Isaac, and Allison have been helping out, which allows them to keep an eye out for any supernaturals that might be after them. She figures that Scott would automatically volunteer out of his kindness, and that Allison and Isaac followed to be able to spend time with their boyfriend. Apparently, though, even at the end of the world, people are still willing to be judgmental assholes – some people have been giving them shit for their poly relationship since day one, even with Lydia (terrifying as she may be) telling them off.

           Cora thinks that everyone should fuck off about other people’s relationships and personal lives, impending death-by-zombies or not, but their predicament leaves her thinking about her own orientation. A lot of Googling in her youth led Cora to the knowledge that she is a homoromantic bisexual: she can only fall in love with girls, but is attracted to all genders. She’s never told anyone, because is it really any of their fucking concern? No – it’s her business, and her business only. And that hasn’t changed, Cora is pretty damn sure, even if it is the middle of the zombie apocalypse.

;;

          Sneaking out in the middle of the night in a room full of supernaturals may be impossible for the average person, but Cora Hale learned a thing or two from her teenage family members. Tip-toeing isn’t exactly ideal, but it seems to work for getting around the sleeping bodies on the floor. No one’s around inside to watch the halls, but outside of the rooms there are a few guards. Although they make it harder to find a quiet place to herself, she eventually finds a crevice with a good view of the sky outside. As she settles down, about to practice her (probably unhealthy) habit of mourning her mother by gazing at the stars, something touches her wrist.

          Immediately, she pins the ‘thing’ down – only to discover that the ‘thing’ has strawberry blonde hair, green eyes, and is not actually a ‘thing’, but is instead Lydia ‘psychic’ Martin.

          “You followed me?  What the fuck, Lydia?  Go back to the room, now!”

           Lydia manages to look down her nose at Cora even from literally beneath her. “I think I’d rather not, as you don’t dictate my actions. And of course I followed you – I had to make sure you weren’t going to bail on the rest of us, or something equally unintelligent. Now, would you be so kind as to get off of me? I can barely breathe.”

           Muttering a quiet apology, Cora levers herself off of Lydia and starts to walk back to their quiet corner. Lydia reaches for her wrist again, but this time Cora just turns around instead of trying to eliminate her.

           “You can do whatever you were about to. I don’t plan on leaving though; I can’t risk you doing something stupid and the rest of us having to pay for it. I won’t make a single sound, you probably won’t even notice I’m here.”

           Normally, she would just threaten Lydia until she went away, but it’s probably best to try and let go of her unnecessary and unhealthy behaviors, so she lets her stay. Maybe it’s ironic that she’s giving up one bad habit just so she can continue another one, but grief isn’t the easiest thing to overcome. 

          The redhead sits down beside her and stares at her inquisitively. So much for the ‘never noticing.’

           “Can you try looking at something else? It’s hard to concentrate on my own thoughts when you’re gawking at me like I swallowed my own finger.”

           “So I make it hard for you to concentrate, huh, Hale? And if it really bothers you that much I’ll try looking up at something else.”

          “You know that’s not what I meant, Martin, and thanks, I guess.”

          “You’re welcome then, I guess.”

          The rest of the night is quiet; Cora stares at the stars, Lydia stares at something other than Cora. As the sky starts to fade to blue, Lydia brushes her wrist for the third time that night. “Get some sleep, Cora, your under-eye circles are making you look like a raccoon.”

;;

          It’s been a week now of Lydia following her out to watch the stars, and Cora secretly thinks that it might not be that bad of a deal after all. Lydia never tries to get her to explain anything, or talk if she’s not in the mood. They talk quietly about how they think this whole zombie thing happened, too; though when Lydia originally brought up the question, Cora had scoffed and insisted that the “why” and “how” are a little low on the priority list right now. The redhead retorted that they probably wouldn’t be able to do anything but worry about the high-priority issues for the time being, and that maybe it would be nice to focus on something dumb, just for a little while.

           Slowly opening up isn’t easy. Cora starts to wonder if the stargazing (or ‘star glaring’, as Lydia calls it) is her problem, or if it’s pretty girls who are a glimpse of the past, standing strong and making people admire them. (It’s probably still the stargazing.)

           During these seven days, the situation has managed to get even grosser and weirder than it was before. The zombies have been wearing down the wall faster than it can be repaired; it’s predicted that the wall will fall down in about two days, and that the people need to be ready for what’s coming. It’s hectic in the building; people are panicking, packing their cars, and planning how to get the hell out of here. The ‘Beacon Hills party pack!’ as Lena has eloquently labelled them (with some encouragement from Stiles, no doubt) plans on splitting up those of them that can drive between the two cars and getting to New York (goddamn east coasters managing snowfall and a fucking apocalypse) as soon as possible.

           Teams that are sent out for food, fuel, and weapons are still coming back, but people have started getting bitten more often, and the amount of survivors is slowly decreasing. As many of their makeshift (or maybe now actual) party pack tries to get on these crews as possible, and usually at least one of them gets picked. Unfortunately they try to avoid taking teenagers, or moms, meaning that a lot of times Derek is selected and no one else. Explaining that “you should pick us even though we’re teenagers because we can probably handle zombies better than you guys, since we happen to be werewolves,” will most likely only add to the panic, so there’s not much they can do except try to teach the other survivors some fighting skills.

           When asked how they became so good at fighting, Stiles’ eager and dumb answer of “karate class!” thankfully doesn’t raise any eyebrows, but it does raise Lydia and Allison’s voices at the boy for completely misunderstanding subtlety.

;;

          It’s the night before the wall is supposed to fall down, and Lydia and Cora are sitting next to each other in their usual spot. It’s probably the only night Cora will be able to say how she feels – because a couple days is apparently enough to develop deep feelings for another person… how fucking great.

           “Lydia, before I decide to shut off my emotions again for the sake of practicality, you need to know that–”

           “I know, Cora, I know.”

           Cora gapes at her, then scoffs. “I plan an entire speech for you and you’re not gonna let me at least deliver it?”

           Lydia smirks. “Well. I guess I’d like to hear it, then.”

           “Well, Lydia Martin, I cannot believe I’m about to say this, but I might have a massive thing for you. And it’s annoying me to no end, because caring about people means you just have another thing that gets to you, but it doesn’t mean I can exactly stop caring about anyone. That’s why I come out here, to see the stars. It was something my mom and I used to do; she’d tell stories underneath the moonlight and we’d trace the stars, and that’s why I do it. That, and the fact that one of her stories was about people going to be in the stars when they die. So thank you for sitting out here and letting me remember her with you.”

           “Thank you for letting me be here while you do something so important to both of you. From what I’ve heard and from what I’ve seen, Talia Hale was a pretty amazing woman and mom, huh?”

           Cora’s definitely beyond embarrassed that Lydia obviously doesn’t feel the same, but what’s she going to do? It’s probably just best for her to shut up and stop expecting everything to be all sunshine, cupcakes, and rainbows. And zombies. Fucking zombies.

           “Oh, and Cora?”

           “Yeah, what?”

           Lydia turns to face Cora. “I might have a massive thing for you too, Cora Hale. You once said that I had bad taste in boys, but my taste in women is pretty impeccable.” Lydia smiles and waits, her lips millimetres from Cora’s. Your move, Hale.

          In a rush of adrenaline or maybe happiness (or possibly both), Cora closes the gap between them. And, goddamn. She’s making out, during the freaking zombie apocalypse, with a girl who is so out of her league that Cora would normally be in the stands watching her hit a home run.

           Cora finds herself smiling like an idiot as they separate. Lydia laces her fingers through Cora’s; Cora leans her head on Lydia’s shoulder.

          “You know I’m coming in the mini van with you guys, right?”

          Cora grins. “Be prepared for Lena.  For a four year old, she can cause a pretty massive headache.”

          “Well, I think I know what I’ll be doing to block her out,” Lydia says, smiling. (Cora gets halfway through the sentence “Want to practice?” before Lydia’s kissing her again.)

;;

          Sure, their state is being overrun with flesh-eating cannibals; people are dying; the future looks bleak. But Cora’s pretty sure that with a bunch of idiots, her pack, and a kickass strawberry blonde psychic-genius on her side, they can kick the apocalypse back into badly written comic books – and get rid of her under-eye circles while she’s at it.

**Author's Note:**

> please let me know if any of the writing here uses problematic concepts/language!!!!! also, if any of you are members or descendents of the Caddo tribe, or if you think that my use of the tale is upsetting in any way, please let me know!!!!! i don't want to use the story as a cheap prop or anything of the sort because i know how that does feel. 
> 
> come talk to me anytime and feel more than welcome to leave any comments below!!!


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